1. Understanding Drivers of Change Within a Wireless Operator
Patrick Nolan

2. Why Are We Here? How wireless operators think
Develop more effective business strategies in the wireless space

3. That’s Amazing! How are you going to do this?!
evolution of a typical wireless network
what drivers caused the changes along the way

4. Let’s work with these two drivers

5. Let’s work with these two drivers
Customer Expectations

6. Let’s work with these two drivers
Customer Expectations
Available Technology

7. Let’s work with these two drivers
Customer Expectations
Available Technology $ $

8. Let’s get started!

9. In the beginning, there was sparse coverage across the city
Site coverage
Basic coverage
Minimal cost
Switch Location

10. People didn’t like dropping calls, so we filled in the holes
Site coverage
They don’t like dropping calls
We added more sites
Switch Location

11. Coverage was good, but the network began congesting.
Site coverage
Network began loading up with customers
Access fails became a problem
We added even more cell sites
Switch location methodology
Switch Location

12. Then came UMTS, and data demand exploded
Site coverage
Customers began wanting full internet surfing experience
We built UMTS
Data demand shot up
Switch Location

13. Let’s zoom in… Site coverage Switch Location
The slides is getting busy
Switch Location

14. Things are looking pretty crowded
Site coverage
Pace not sustainable with UMTS
Switch Location

15. It’s getting expensive to keep customers happy.
Customer Expectations
Available Technology $ $
What are we going to do? Let’s compare UMTS to LTE.

16. Throughput: UMTS vs LTE
Considering the customer demand for ever higher throughputs capability, you can see why we would invest in LTE.
Note: From “Performance Comparison of UMTS and LTE on The Basis of Data Rates” by INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF ELECTRONICS AND COMMUNICATION ENGINEERING & TECHNOLOGY (IJECET). Retrieved from

17. What about the cost of UMTS vs LTE?
Note: From “UMTS vs. LTE: a comparison overview Unik4230: Mobile Communications” by Khai Vuong. Retrieved from

18. Great, we have LTE. Now what?
Site coverage
Switch Location

19. New demands cause more extreme capacity issues
Site coverage
Adding more macro sites isn’t always the best solution.
Switch Location

20. DAS and small cells are great solutions
Site coverage
DAS and small cell
Targeted coverage
Small cell definitely cheaper
Switch Location

21. Let’s Summarize Customer Expectation Technology Available
Operator Action
Revenue
Operational Cost

22. Let’s Summarize Customer Expectation Technology Available
Operator Action
Revenue
Operational Cost
A wireless phone
1G, 2G
Build basic network

23. Let’s Summarize Customer Expectation Technology Available
Operator Action
Revenue
Operational Cost
A wireless phone
1G, 2G
Build basic network
Don’t drop calls
Build more sites

24. Let’s Summarize Customer Expectation Technology Available
Operator Action
Revenue
Operational Cost
A wireless phone
1G, 2G
Build basic network
Don’t drop calls
Build more sites
Fix congestion 2G

25. Let’s Summarize Customer Expectation Technology Available
Operator Action
Revenue
Operational Cost
A wireless phone 2G
Build basic network
Don’t drop calls
Build more sites
Fix congestion
2G, 3G
Faster data
Build UMTS

26. More Summarizing Customer Expectation Technology Available
Operator Action
Revenue
Operational Cost

27. More Summarizing Customer Expectation Technology Available
Operator Action
Revenue
Operational Cost
Even more data
2G, 3G, LTE
Build more UMTS

28. More Summarizing Customer Expectation Technology Available
Operator Action
Revenue
Operational Cost
Even more data
2G, 3G, LTE
Build more UMTS
Still not enough!
Build LTE

29. More Summarizing Customer Expectation Technology Available
Operator Action
Revenue
Operational Cost
Even more data
2G, 3G, LTE
Build more UMTS
Still not enough!
Build LTE
Fix throughput hotspots
3G, LTE, DAS, small cell
Build over hot spots

30. Let’s look into the future
Customer Expectations
Latency
More video streaming
Available Technology 5G
SDN/NFV

31. Thank You!